


Perception and Reality

by Deannie



Category: The Real Ghostbusters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-06
Updated: 2014-07-06
Packaged: 2018-02-07 15:01:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1903431
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deannie/pseuds/Deannie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are times when a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing. There are also times when a lot of knowledge can drive you around the friggin' bend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Perception and Reality

There are times when a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing. There are also times when a lot of knowledge can drive you around the friggin' bend. Case in point:

I'm sitting here in the dark, knees to my chest on my hospital bed, shivering. Reaction--for a psychologist, a classic and easily identifiable result of mental trauma. Another frequent result of mental trauma is the inability to reconcile perception and reality.

I know Egon Spengler is alive. I _know_ it--mostly because I can hear him snoring comfortably on the other side of the room. I know he's not lying dead in a warehouse, killed by the drugged out psycho that stabbed him this morning, right before he died in my arms.

I also know that I finally lost him. I finally have to do the thing I never wanted to do--learn to live without the closest friend I'll ever have. Because I know he's dead, even though his snores are measuring on the Richter scale.

See what I mean?

 

Okay, now listen up, because I am _not_ going over this again.

What happened was this: We went over to Brooklyn to bust a class three. Simple, right? It had been bothering a construction crew that was tearing down an old warehouse. The crew had said it looked like a man--a street punk, from a number of the descriptions. Ray had the wonderful notion that maybe we could talk it into dispersing, but somehow I doubted a street punk--especially a dead one--was going to listen to the likes of us.

The team had to split up pretty quickly because the place was just _huge_ , so Egon and I had gone one way, and Ray and Winston had gone the other. No problem, right? We did it all the time.

It was just our bad luck that the gooper found me and Egon before we were ready.

It was big, ugly, and had a hell of a temper. Par for the course. But it also had an obnoxious habit of throwing building materials at us--well, more specifically, at _me._ I dodged a couple of big boards without a problem, but just as I finally got him caught in my stream, the third plank hit me square in the back of the head. I know there's the whole cliche about seeing stars, but I didn't. I just dropped like a stone.

But I thought I was fine. Really. Well, after I woke up, that is. This was my first brush with perception and reality today. I could hear Egon calling to me, hear him shouting for Ray and Winston on his walkie-talkie, hear the fear in his voice that seems to surface only when one of the rest of us is in trouble.

"I'm fine, Egon," I grated angrily, rising and getting my bearings. The gooper was just hovering, waiting. Waiting to go down, if my temper had anything to say in the matter. With a vengeful grunt, I flipped my thrower back on and pegged it again, feeling a really unflattering flush of satisfaction as Egon's beam hit it a second later.

And that's when things _seemed_ to go to hell.

I remember every second of that next five minutes. I remember seeing the unexpected form of a junkie behind Egon, the dilated eyes wide as he tried to decide whether the pissed off class three was an hallucination or the truth. I remember yelling to Egon, telling him to watch out, letting him know that there was a civilian behind him. I remember him turning slightly, his thrower still trained on the ghost, and calling for the junkie to get the hell out.

And I remember the gut-wrenching moment when the kid, strung out on something--maybe more than one something--surged forward and stabbed at Egon with the kind of speed that only comes from PCP or meth.

Then the trap opened. The ghost went down with a scream that sounded almost vengeful, as if _it_ had caused the stabbing. And then I ran for my life to Egon's side, barely noticing that the kid with the knife had fled as soon as the trap snapped shut.

"Egon?" I know I barely whispered, taking in the rapidly spreading lake of blood, the hole in his jumpsuit not an inch from his heart. I knelt beside him, mashing a hand down on the wound and shivering when he didn't even respond to the pain. "Can you hear me?"

For a second, I thought he'd already left me. My voice suddenly exploded around me, screaming for Winston and Ray, but I don't remember making a sound. I just remember Egon's eyes fluttering under their lids, telling me that, for now, he was still around.

"Peter?"

You would think that a good, clear, lucid response would have made me feel better, but it didn't. His eyes, when they opened, were clear and sharp... and dying. Winston had, in one of his rare moments of openness about that time in his life, talked once about a buddy of his who had been killed in Vietnam. The guy had had half of his chest blown out by a landmine, but he had spoken to Winston in clear and logical tones for the last moments of his life. Clarity before death. Shock combined with extreme blood loss, adding up to a painless, lucid last minute of existence.

Egon's blood was pooling around my knees.

"I'm here, Egon," I croaked. "The guys are coming. Just lie still. You'll be fine."

He'd grimaced at me. "Surely you don't think you could lie to me and pull it off at this late date, Peter?"

I can still feel the pain in my chest at his words. He was dying. Where the hell were Ray and Winston when Egon was dying?

"Just stay there, Egon," I pleaded. I think that's what I said. Maybe just "Just stay." That was what I meant, anyway.

"Peter, please?" His own plea led my eyes to finally connect with his, and I know he saw my assessment of the situation in them. "Just this once."

Just this once, what? I _still_ don't know. I would ask him now, but...

But he wouldn't know either.

I remember grabbing his hand, begging him to just hold on. The hand I had pressed painfully into his chest wound was going numb by this time, but I wasn't about to move it.

"Talk to me, Egon," I begged. "Come on, stay with me here." I shook the hand I was holding, feeling it growing cold in my grip. "If you do this, I'll kick your ass!"

"That would hardly be useful, would it?" he asked clearly. No slurring. No pain-filled hiss. I wondered if he'd even feel it when he actually did...

"I'll find you then," I told him fiercely. "I'll hunt you down and beat some sense into your ghost! Just don't leave me. _Please?_ "

He smiled at that, and I remember my heart breaking right there. I think I was probably surprised _I_ wasn't bleeding out, too.

"Peter, I'm sorry but--"

"Sorry, my ass!" I retorted, ignoring the fact that, contrary to my self-promoted image as a macho man, I had started to cry in earnest now. "You stay put or I'll..."

His eyes were closed now. I could see him breathing, sort of, but his chest only rose occasionally. I still had to wonder where the hell Winston and Ray were. Ray should be here when...

Shit.

I remember gathering him into my arms, hugging him to me with all my might. My right hand still tingled--it still does, actually--from the pressure of trying to hold his blood in. That was kind of a moot point, anyway, so I wrapped both arms around him and held on.

"Egon?"

"...What, Peter?"

His response shook me. Somehow, I thought he'd already gone.

"I love you," I whispered. His hair under my chin was soft. I don't actually have call to do more than occasionally mess up that wild 'do, just to tick him off... I never imagined it would be so soft. "You know that, right?"

"I love you, too, Peter," he said. His voice was weaker now, but no less clear.

"If you love me, you won't leave," I told him firmly, even as I felt him stop breathing for a longer moment.

He started again, but only for as long as it took him to say two words.

"I'm sorry..."

Then I had a little breakdown. Like a blinding light, almost like a trap shut in my head, I realized that he was finally leaving me. And for a second there, I hated him for it.

 

Memory is a funny thing. Sense memory is always stronger than any word or sound or sight you'll ever know. My hand tingles, I can feel soft, long, blond hair under my chin, I can feel a sticky wetness where I knelt in his blood... I'm sitting here shivering because I can feel the cold that seeped into my bones from him after he died. I held him forever, as he grew colder and colder...

But he's across the room snoring! And he doesn't even know he was ever gone. And neither does anyone else.

Except me.

 

Time became kind of meaningless after he died. I stopped even caring where Ray and Winston had got to, and just concentrated on shutting down. I found out that I'm surprisingly good at it--though, come to think of it, maybe the _guys_ wouldn't be so surprised, considering my sleeping habits. I had just gotten to where I couldn't feel or see or smell, and was working on taste and sound, when I heard a panicked voice.

"Peter!?"

Ray. I almost cried again right there, but I had done such a good job of shutting down that I couldn't quite reconnect with my body. Ray must have found us-- _finally_. He must be dying himself, I thought.

"Winston? He's not waking up!"

I must have made some connection, because I could feel Winston's hand at my neck. I knew right away that it was Winston. Don't know how--I just knew.

"His pulse is strong, guys, he'll be okay." I guessed I would be. Winston had more medical training than all three of--than Ray and me put together. If he said I would be okay, he must be right.

"How you doing, Egon?"

I was back--all connections firmly in place. My eyes snapped open and I know they had to be filled with rage as I sought out Winston's face. How _dare_ he pretend that Egon was anything other than dead--and in front of Ray, too! I was about to ream him but good when a sound assaulted me. A big, bass, weary sound.

A dead man's sound.

"I'll be fine, Winston," said the dead Egon. "But I'm worried that Peter hasn't regained consciousness. He hasn't moved since the ghost--Peter?"

I just stared. God, I must have looked like I'd suffered complete brain damage--and I'm still not sure I haven't--but I couldn't do anything but look at him. Egon. Egon alive. Egon with a thin trail of blood down one side of his face, blood that was only now starting to dot onto his clean, unmarred jumpsuit. I just couldn't get it. I even reached up to touch the blood, pulling back when Egon, who just had to be surprised as shit by me, did the same.

"Peter?" he asked cautiously. He reached out a hand to me, and I just watched him do it. At his touch, I remember starting to shiver. I don't know that I've really stopped yet. "Peter, it's Egon. Can you hear me?"

Sometimes there's a point when your brain is just not going to take any more abuse. A time when you just shut down anything that doesn't fit. Cognitive dissonance. Egon was dead, so I looked at Ray instead. Because Egon was dead, so he couldn't be talking to me.

Because he was dead.

"Ray?"

Ray looked at Egon, and I assume Egon looked hurt. I'm assuming because, cognitive dissonance, baby. No see, no hear. After a minute, my adopted little brother moved forward, his hand replacing the nonexistent one that was holding mine. "I'm here, Peter."

"What happened?"

"The ghost knocked you out with a two-by-four," Winston replied, exchanging his own glance with my dead friend. "You've been out about twenty minutes. You scared the hell out of us!"

Twenty minutes... Enough time for...

"Did you get it?"

That made Winston smile. And a smiling Winston is one who knows I'm not going to die, so I liked that. "Egon got him, my man," he assured me. "He took a hell of a hit for it, but he bagged him before Ray and I even got here."

I must have finally been coming around, because I actually looked the apparition in the eyes. Egon's eyes were full of pain--I'm sure now at least half of it was mental and all of it my fault--and they had none of the calm, near-death lucidity I remembered seeing in them just a few minutes before.

I wonder what I sounded like when I spoke his name? It must have been something nasty, because he almost flinched at it. "Egon?"

"Peter?" He was worried. Seriously worried. At the time, I thought it was great! Not that I like him worried, but I like him dead even less. "Are you okay?"

I shook my head, which, for those keeping score, is the fifth stupidest thing I've ever done. This time I did see stars. But behind the stars, staring down at me in concern, were the eyes I never thought I'd see awake and alive again. That old problem with perception and reality hit me hard and I groaned at the pain.

"My... head hurts," I offered lamely. I had no clue at that point what the hell was going on, but I didn't really have the brain power to deal with it, so I let it go. I heard some really dim sirens in the background.

"We'll get you to the hospital," Winston assured me. Well, maybe assurance isn't the word when we're talking about hospitals. I hate them more than I hate Walter Peck. Okay, maybe not that much, but...

"Can you sit up? I know it won't be pleasant... but just a little? The... floor is cold."

Egon again, worrying about me and my thing with cold. Actually, I don't _really_ have that much of a problem with it, I just like warm better. Still, it showed how stressed he was, and I wish now that I'd been with it enough to apologize for ignoring him, but I don't think I even got that this wasn't just some dream I wanted to be real.

I wonder, looking at him sleeping in that hospital chair, if I've even got it yet.

He was holding out a hand to me, and I took it, feeling the reality of it. Bracing himself, he got ready to lever me up, but I just couldn't help. He fell forward slightly, and I did something out of instinct that I rarely do in more lucid times. I hugged him. Hard.

"Peter?" The worry was rapidly getting out of control, and I wish I had been smart enough to make some of it go away, make some witty remark that would give me that soft-yet-blinding Spengler grin. I'm not holding on to any guilt over that, though, let me tell you. I was just glad to feel a warm body in my arms, no matter how worried it was.

 

I don't remember much else--Winston says I stayed pretty out of it until I got to the hospital. But I do remember Egon sitting on the side of my hospital bed a few hours later, looking at me, flanked by the guys, who were trying to look reassuring while completely scared to death. That's such a neat trick! I'm sorry now that I taught it to them.

Egon wanted answers, I know, but, as yet, I haven't given them. He mentioned something about the ghost, something about the fact that I was pretty out of it--like delirious out of it--until he managed to trap the damn thing. But I wasn't really listening, so I'm still not sure what the hell he was talking about. I was just stunned that he was around to talk at all.

Stunned, and really, _totally_ confused.

Spengs knew it, of course, and tried to ask again what I had felt, what I'd seen. At the time, I simply threw off one of my many ready quips and feigned sleep to get away--which didn't help too much, because all I'd seen and felt came rushing back for a curtain call on the backs of my eyelids. Still, at least he left me alone for a minute. I should have known I wouldn't get off so easy when he announced to the others that he was going to stay the night here, no matter what the nurses said.

 

I can see him over there in that wildly uncomfortable plastic chair now, and I have to wonder why I haven't spilled the beans. A pain shared is a pain halved, right? But maybe not in this case.

Egon doesn't know he ever died. Ray and Winston never had to find me cradling his blood-soaked body. I've figured out over the last five or six hours that, for whatever reason, the hell I've just experienced didn't happen--at least not anywhere on this planet. A freak dimensional shift? A result of the bust? Who knows?

The only thing I do know is that, when I look at Egon, I'm just totally amazed to find him breathing. My arms still ache from holding his dead body, but I know he's alive.

And it's like I'm going crazy.

So, this kind of anguish and insanity isn't something you really want to share, is it? I mean, Egon's alive, right? Why should I get the others all worked up when it was just some weird head-trauma-induced dream?

Except that I haven't really got a lot of head trauma. The two-by-four wasn't all that bad. They're keeping me overnight here more because they can't figure out why I took a snooze for almost half an hour. _I_ know what I was doing, but they haven't got a clue. I don't know why it happened, or what the hell it was, and I'd just as soon not bother anyone with the details, now that I've finally woken up from said dream.

Of course, I'm having a hell of a time figuring out just which part of this _is_ a dream, anyway. What if I wake up and find myself back on the floor, with his body in my arms? What if _this_ is perception, and that was reality? What if...?

"Peter?"

I have to wonder how many times he's said that in the last day. It seems like an awful lot. And every time, it's laced with the same worry and hurt. Well, the hurt, I can do something about right now.

"Hey, Spengs. Look, I know I was a little out of it this morning and--"

He isn't buying it. I can tell by the way he moves forward, taking my right hand and stilling--at least a little--the tingling that I just can't seem to shake. "What happened at the warehouse, Peter?" He seems like he really wants to know, and right now, I _really_ want to tell him. "You saw something, didn't you?"

But I still don't. What's wrong with me, anyway? Dr. Venkman can make anyone talk--hell, even Egon. But talk about himself? Oh no! Petey don't play that game. "I saw stars, Egon," I assure him. "Lots and lots of stars."

"Stop it." Uh oh. Egon's pissed. "When you were... unconscious..." Is that so hard to say? Better than "dead," my friend. "You were talking... mumbling." I can see the worry shining even brighter in those baby blues. God, why can't I just tell him what happened? "You seemed to be experiencing _something_ \--something other than your normal post-concussive stupor." I want to reach out to him as he takes a deep breath. "Whatever it was, it is obviously still bothering you." And that's bothering _you,_ Spengs, isn't it? I can see it in the sad concern in his eyes. "You really were quite... talkative... At least for the first few minutes."

Then I hid--expertly, thank you very much. What am I supposed to say here? Well, you know, Egon, after you died, there wasn't much to say, was there? That'd thrill him. Still... He's looking really scared. Don't be so surprised--I've seen him scared before. It _does_ happen.

I wonder what he thought. He saw me lying there, in la-la land, and--especially if he heard half the things I remember saying, which I am really hoping to God he didn't--he must have wondered whether I was really going to be okay when I woke up. _If_ I woke up. I know now that somehow, I got sucked into some other place--a terrifying place where Egon was dying and I couldn't save him and the whole world was going to end right there... And then I just got spit back out. But that twenty minutes in the Twilight Zone must have been hell on him.

I know it was on me.

I just _have_ to stop shaking like this!

"I don't know, Egon." God, I hope this lie works. I don't have the strength for this. "I don't remember anything."

"Peter," he's saying now, a repressive sound I never thought I'd ever _want_ to hear. "After all these years, if you think you can lie to me--"

Now I really can't stop shaking. I think I'm going to rattle something loose, but I can't stop!

"Peter?"

_Surely you don't think you can lie to me and get away with it at this late date, Peter?_

"Answer me! Peter!"

I can't. I can't stop shaking. I can't stop seeing him on the floor, seeing the blood all around him. Oh, _God._ Egon!

He's moving--he's not letting go, not moving away-- _God, don't let him move away from me now, please!_ I can dimly feel him shift around to sit on the bed, to wrap his arms around me. Just like I did! Just like I did when he died...

"Peter, talk to me," he's begging. Egon's begging. Gotta be a red-letter day, huh? "Talk to me! Tell me what happened. _Please!_ "

And suddenly, I am. I'm spilling my guts, telling him absolutely everything. I don't think I'm leaving anything out--I might not be making any sense, but I think I'm capturing the whole fucking experience pretty well. As I wind down, I can hear him whispering something soothing, though I have no idea what it is. I'm crying again--twice in one day. Man, I have _got_ to call the papers about that! Of course, part of me knows that the first time didn't really happen, so I guess once a day is okay, right?

God, _why_ can't I stop shaking!?

"Shhh." His cheek is on my head. Is my hair as soft as his? Probably not--not after today. I really need a shower. "Peter... I'm here."

I shake my head, ignoring the pain in the back of my skull. It isn't the worst pain I'm feeling now anyway. "But you died in my arms..." Gotta wonder how pathetic _that_ sounds, huh?

"I didn't," he assures me steadily. I can't seem to get my wits together, but I have to. He sounds like _he's_ going crazy, and we can't have _that_.

"I can still..." I don't know what I can still feel. Right now, I'm trying to concentrate on feeling him behind and around me. "Egon, I saw..."

He's rocking me now, like my mom used to. God, I thought I'd never have him to lean on again. I know what's happening--my psych degree isn't just decorative, you know--but I can't stop it and I really need him right now, right where he is, image be damned. My mind is trying to reconcile what I remember from the-- _whatever_ \--with the reality of the man who's holding me up, and it's blowing a gasket in the process. It's almost like I have him behind me, alive, and at my chest, in my arms, de--

"I'm right here, Peter." I wonder--as I have in the past--if he can read my mind. If he can, I feel _so_ sorry for him right now. "I'm alive. I'm right here."

"I know." I don't--not really--but I have to say something. Insisting he's dead is a little stupid. I mean, who's going to win that argument, huh? Egon, just like always.

"Did you see the ghost? Really see it?"

I can't believe he wants to talk about the ghost right now! "Little tough to get a good look when it's throwing two-by-fours, Egon," I quip tiredly.

"The ghost was a street punk," he's explaining carefully. He's running a hand through my hair. I should probably be embarrassed, but it feels good--especially because he's alive to do it. "He had a wound in his chest. A large one."

Okay, I am _so_ not connecting here. So what? What the hell does the ghost have to do with it?

"Because I think the ghost might have made your... vision." Did I ask that out loud? I must have, because I think if he really could read my mind, he'd have run for safety a long time ago.

"But you got the ghost." I'm not sure why I don't want it to be the ghost's doing. I mean, if that's the case, I'm sane, right? Sane is good, isn't it? Beats a straightjacket and strained peas for the rest of my life.

He tightens his grip on me. "Not before he knocked you out, Peter--which he did just as you got a stream locked onto him. And you stopped... moving... right after the trap closed." He falls silent, and I wonder again what he must have felt like when I dropped. Probably a lot like I had when--

No. That didn't happen. It absolutely didn't happen. I have a six-foot-plus pillow that says it didn't.

Wait a minute... Right after the trap closed? Right after Egon died, right? The breakdown. I even thought it _felt_ like a trap... That would explain it...

"It projected its death?" I'm grasping at straws here, but I really want this to be over now. I really need to see Egon and not see him dying. I need to be sane again--just for a little while. "It tried to get me to stop attacking it, but once it went down it couldn't keep up the illusion?"

I can feel him nod into my scalp. "I think so. Maybe he was killed in a dispute over drugs. Maybe, when we tried to trap him, he lashed out the only way he could."

See, there's a difference between us. Egon says "he," I say "it." I don't want the ghost to be a he. I want the ghost to be an it. Preferably a very far away it. God, I want to believe him--I think I mostly do already.

"But..."

He's going for the world record in Peter-squeezing. "Peter," he's whispering, steel and caring in his voice. " _I'm here._ I'm here, I'm alive, and I'm not going anywhere."

And suddenly I'm not shaking anymore. I can't believe it. God, I'm not shaking. I can feel my eyes close, but I pop them open right away.

I haven't been able to close my eyes comfortably since I really woke up. Faking my nap a while back took everything I had, because all I could see was Egon. Not the guy cradling me right now, not my oldest friend in the world, whose heart is beating just behind my head, but the one I saw die. The one who left me alone. The one I don't think I ever would have forgiven.

"Don't ever leave." I mean it, and I'm sure he can tell. "If you ever leave me, Egon, I swear I'll..." I can't keep talking. God, I don't even know what I was going to say! Who the hell makes that kind of threat, huh?

"I promise, Peter." His whisper is just the thing--it's a lie, of course, because he can't make that promise, but I am so willing to be lied to right now... I can finally close my eyes and find darkness. As I do, I can still feel his heart behind me, beating away. "I _do_ love you, and I won't leave."

"You heard that?" I wonder what else I said. I wonder what he thought when I did? God, I'm too tired to think about this now. Can't I do it later?

"Yes, Peter." Wait--which question is he answering? Well, at least _he_ sounds a little more content. "And I have to say, attempting to kick my ass would be futile--at any time."

Actually, _I_ must be more content too, because that didn't send the zinger through my heart I thought it would. I'm even laughing, though I bet it sounds a little shaky.

I can feel sleep creeping in now, and I think I'll let it this time. After all, Egon will be here if I have a nightmare--okay, be realistic, Venkman, _when_ I have a nightmare.

Because he promised, right? And Egon never breaks a promise--not an important one.

And that, my friends, is reality.

* * *  
The End


End file.
